County Road bridge in Louisville won't be replaced until 2016

Construction crews in March work to remove debris from the former County Road bridge in Louisville. (David R. Jennings / Colorado Hometown Weekly)

Downtown Louisville keeps expanding south on County Road, but as things currently stand, that expansion eventually will hit a dead end — or, rather, a washout.

The bridge on County Road, immediately south of Louisville Community Park, was swept away by Coal Creek during last year's flood. City officials recently said the bridge, which already has been closed for 11 months, won't reopen until 2016.

"Currently we're targeting August 2015 to start the construction of the bridge and plan to open the bridge somewhere between January and March of 2016," said Kurt Kowar, Louisville Public Works director.

But the project already is well underway, Louisville City Manager Malcolm Fleming said.

Runners travel along County Road south of Bella Vista Drive in Louisville on Oct. 26 to look at where the bridge was destroyed by September's floods. (David R. Jennings / Colorado Hometown Weekly)

"Even though it's been quiet on County Road bridge, we've been doing a lot of behind-the-scenes work. We are in the middle of design work for that bridge," Fleming said. "Part of the reason we're taking time is we had to comply with all the federal highway standards to get the design completed, to get a contractor on board to do that and to get design approval in the first place."

The previous bridge structure has been removed and the adjacent creek banks have been rip-rapped to prevent erosion.

Because Louisville has applied for reimbursement for the bridge replacement project, it has to make sure every box is checked throughout the process, Fleming said.

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"We are looking for virtually full reimbursement for the $3.6 million cost of that project," he said. "To do that, we have to follow all the federal highway and other rules that are applicable to that design."

County Road appears poised to be the next artery in the expansion of the city's wildly popular downtown district.

The Louisville City Council on Tuesday approved a planned unit development for the historic grain elevator site, a stone's throw from the County Road bridge washout. A construction timeline for that project has yet to be determined.

Kowar said that, unfortunately, the bridge timeline can't be rushed.

"The bridge design is going through a normal Colorado Department of Transportation process and that takes time," Kowar said. "They have several levels of review with their various departments and in-house staff. It has taken this long just to get into that process with an approved concept of how big the bridge may be related to a 100-year flood."

Kowar said public meetings will be scheduled during the next three months to discuss the design concept for the bridge and what it will look like aesthetically.

"That will be something the public will see and be part of as we begin this process," Kowar said.

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